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Dessert

Candy Pudding

A pudding made with blanched almonds, raisins, figs, citron, sweet cream, butter, vanilla, and sugar.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 9 ingredients
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Why it works: Fig and vanilla match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 1% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 324 recipes. Both carry beta-damascenone, which smells apple, rose. The science ↓

Candy Pudding

Ingredients

Directions

Make the base

  1. Mix sugar with a little water to form a paste.

  2. Add butter, cream, and vanilla to the mixture.

  3. Boil until it begins to thicken.

Add the fruit and cook

  1. Stir in the fruit.

  2. Cook until the almonds brown, about 25 minutes.

Shape and serve

  1. Pour the mixture into a cloth.

  2. Roll it up like a boiled pudding.

  3. Let it cool.

  4. Cut into slices.

Recipe from a historical cookbook (Internet Archive).

Transcribed from a scanned cookbook and modernised for today's kitchens. Where the book gave no heat or time, or said "a moderate oven", the temperatures and times here may be modern equivalents rather than the book's own figures.

Explore the science

The flavor team

The pairs that carry this dish. Each one is judged two ways: how much their aromas overlap, and how often cooks already put them together.

  1. Fig + vanillatop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together324 recipes

    Shared aroma: beta-damascenone (apple, rose).

  2. Almond + raisintop 2% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together1,781 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-nonanone (fruity, floral).

  3. Almond + figtop 3% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together519 recipes

    Shared aroma: alpha-pinene (pine, turpentine).

  4. Almond + vanillatop 4% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together3,961 recipes

    Shared aroma: eucalyptol (eucalyptus, herbal).

  5. Raisin + figtop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together737 recipes

    Shared aroma: beta-damascenone (apple, rose).

Ranks compare each pair with 20,000 random ingredient pairs on CompKitchen. How we score pairs

What each ingredient does

Almonds
Provide bulk, crunch, and nutty flavor, and brown during cooking.
Butter
Adds richness and fat, giving the pudding a soft, tender texture.
Sweet cream
Adds moisture and richness, helping the mixture thicken into a soft body.
Raisins
Add concentrated sweetness and chewy moisture to the fruit mixture.
Figs
Add soft texture and natural sweetness throughout the pudding.

The step that matters

Boil until it begins to thicken. Stopping too early leaves the mixture too loose to roll and slice, while overcooking makes it stiff and dry. Sugar and cream thicken as water evaporates and proteins and starch set, so watching the texture matters.

Swap the raisin

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (almond, fig, cream, butter, vanilla, sugar):

  1. Peachfits better
  2. Apricotfits better
  3. Coconutfits better
  4. Raisinthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against almond, fig, cream, butter, vanilla, sugar. Candidates are from the same food group and used in at least 100 recipes.

“What each ingredient does” and “The step that matters” were written by Claude from this recipe’s own method and reviewed in samples by CompKitchen.

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